On the opposite seat were two Belgian officers--an elderly man with a
white moustache and grizzled eyebrows under his high kepi and a
young man in a tasselled forage cap, like a boy-student. They both
sat in a limp, dejected way. There was defeat and despair in their
attitude It was only when the younger man shifted his right leg with a
sudden grimace of pain that I saw he was wounded.
Here in these two carriages through which I could glimpse were a few
souls holding in their memory all the sorrow and suffering of poor,
stricken Belgium. Upon this long train were a thousand other men
and women in the same plight and with the same grief.
Next to me in the corridor was a young man with a pale beard and
moustache and fine delicate features. He had an air of distinction,
and his clothes suggested a man of some wealth and standing. I
spoke to him, a few commonplace sentences, and found, as I had
guessed, that he was a Belgian refugee.
"Where are you going?" I asked.
He smiled at me and shrugged his shoulders slightly.
"Anywhere. What does it matter? I have lost everything. One place is
as good as another for a ruined man."
He did not speak emotionally. There was no thrill of despair in his
voice.
Pages:
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264